Whitley woke up in an unfamiliar yet remarkably comfortable bed with a mild headache. Through her brain fog, she picked up some sort of sound in the room around her, but she would get to that in a moment. Feeling under the covers, Whitley realized she'd removed her jeans and sweatshirt at some point, leaving her in only her underwear and a t-shirt. She sincerely hoped she'd lost her pants after going to bed, and she was still in the house she last remembered being in. Her forearm struck a wooden nightstand upon which her phone sat charging. The screen read six-thirty, an hour she had not seen in quite some time.
She eventually pieced together the annoyingly persistent sound in the room as knocking, seasoned with polite requests to enter. Whitley impulsively emitted a confused affirmative, and a figure promptly burst in, bounded up to the bed, and stood above her. While she couldn't see too well in the early morning light, Whitley caught the silhouette of tied pigtails, as well as characteristically broad shoulders which bounced up and down with abundant energy.
"Wanna jog? I could use a buddy."
Oh. It's her.
Alicia's request did not initially register with Whitley, who still struggled to piece together her situation. Save for a few words the previous evening spent mostly with Krysta, Whitley had not yet gotten to know Alicia. At some point past midnight, she and Krysta switched from weed to wine, which probably wasn't a terrific idea if she'd had any intentions of to stay sober enough to drive home. The image of Alicia standing above her started to seem familiar.
"You and Krista hit the sauce pretty hard last night. I had to drag you up here to the...um, guest bedroom. So, wanna jog off your hangover?"
Setting aside that Whitley was pretty sure "jogging off a hangover" wasn't a thing, she hadn't jogged since her last volleyball season almost a year ago. It also couldn't have been much longer than four hours since she'd collapsed into bed, and she'd need at least twice that many hours of sleep before she could reasonably operate as a functional human being.
"We can be quick. Just a few miles, I know a great route. Looks like you've got shoes in your car, and I have some shorts that will fit you. I checked your pants size on your jeans downstairs."
How did I leave my pants downstairs, and...did she go in my car?
The idea of getting to know someone while out on a morning jog was about as attractive of an idea as getting to know her in the waiting room of a dentist's office. Every time she considered it, Whitley thought less and less of the idea of going on a morning jog with this maniac.
...which is why she was so surprised to find herself stepping out onto the front porch with Alicia's bright, eager smile beaming up at her in the soft morning sunlight. She barely missed hitting her head on the awning, and plodded down the steps toward Alicia, who patiently trotted in place, unabashedly gaping at Whitley's body.
"Wow, you are long! I've never seen anyone shaped like you before."
"I don't even know how to respond to that, let alone how you managed to talk me into coming out here."
"Let's head down Kenton St, away from Empire. It's less busy, and it will look gorgeous this time of day." Alicia propelled her brawny physique down the road with unexpected grace. Despite Whitley's 53-inch inseam, it took more effort than expected to catch her. When Whitley realized it might be easier (and quieter) to jog a little behind her, Alicia promptly slowed up until the two girls ran right alongside each other.
"So, are you a model?" Alicia asked.
"Are you kidding? I think I'm about a foot too tall for that question."
"No, not like a model model. A kink model. You know, for tall admirers."
"Wow. You just said that out loud."
You're super cute, with small boobs, big eyes, and worship-worthy legs! I mean, why not?"
"You don't have a filter, do you?"
"I bet you could charge, at least fifteen bucks a month per subscriber, probably twenty if you're willing to go topless."
"I'm just gonna assume this is how you get to know everyone you meet."
"Oh my God! You could totally do videos where you do tall stuff, like duck under door frames, squish into cars, and compare yourself to normal-sized people."
"Are you saying I'm not normal?"
"Why else would you be so cool about living with two webcam models?"
Whitley clenched her eyes shut. Only a few minutes in, this jog had already gone on way too long. Whitley only allowed the conversation to continue because it distracted her both from running and her persistent hangover.
"Because I need a cheap place to stay. My job at the college ended up only being part-time, so I'm on a budget." Whitley gasped for breath and slowed to a fast walk. Alicia switched to jogging backward in large circles around her. "I certainly didn't know I was moving in with internet models."
"If you'd known before you came to visit, would you have even considered us?"
"I dunno, probably. I was honestly more worried about whoever you two were being okay with me."
Alicia chortled. "Yeah, we Googled you a bunch! We even found this awesome news report about you."
Whitley stopped dead in her tracks, though the pained look on her face had nothing to do with jogging. "Not that one from high school..."
"Over 200,000 views. Yeah, we totally found it!"
Well, fucketty fuck.